Beach Party At The River's Edge Gallery

 

George Herriman

6x9

watercolor on Arches watercolor paper

Starting tomorrow, January 18th and running sometime through February, the River's Edge Gallery in Wyandotte MI will be having their annual Beach P-ART-y exhibit. You know, an anti-cold type extravaganza. 

The exhibit will feature some works from their stable of artists (including me!) along with some newer talent. On the second floor, some of my watercolor portraits will be on display, including the George Herriman (creator of Krazy Kat) shown above. Recently, the gallery sold my Diego Rivera/Frida Kahlo watercolor, so here is your chance to see and maybe purchase a portrait from this series. Support local art!

Unfortunately, I cannot be there for the opening and will probably stop in during the next week, or so, and I will probably be there for the closing in February. But, don't let that stop you (pshaw!), go check out the show. I'm sure that there will be a whole shoreline of great artwork. See what I did there? 

Iggy Pop

Iggy Pop

9x12

watercolor

To say that Mr. Pop is an inspiration is kind of a weird thing. Just what has he inspired? He's kind of a nut, seems to have always been one. It could be his relentless punk/rock middle finger extended at the sterile, corporate banality of a certain way of thinking that has infected our culture. That would do it. But, to probe a little deeper, I think there is something more going on in his music that was appears on the surface. Brick By Brick, the song and the album have a lot of that. A search for character, for a truth that remains in the distance, something better. That's what I find inspiring. Combine that with that middle finger and you just might see it.

And if you don't agree, well, his version of Louie, Louie is rather entertaining.

This and more portraits will be part of my Facets of Inspiration exhibit at The River's Edge Gallery in Wyandotte, MI starting on April 18th.

SOLD

Laurence Fishburne

Laurence Fishburne

6x9 (unframed)

watercolor

Are we inspired by the person/actor or do we just connect with the roles that they play? In the best of both worlds, I would like to say both. I've always liked Laurence Fishburne and the roles that he has given us. In interviews, both in print and on camera, he seems genuine. There is a consistency there. I like his voice, very distinct and I'm drawn to the cadence and sound of it. And as for the roles that he plays in his movies? From Apocalypse Now (he was only 16 when he began filming) to the Matrix, there's an impressive body of work there.

He was Morpheus, for Pete's sake... 

This and many more portraits like this will be on view and for sale next month for my show at the River's Edge Gallery in Wyandotte, MI. More details forthcoming.

John Lee Hooker

John Lee Hooker

9x6 (unframed)

watercolor

That voice. He told us to leave his wife alone. He told us that the Motor city was burning. He told us to huckle up, baby. He told us about one scotch, one bourbon and one beer. And he even told us that he eats heavy metal. And we listened. I know that I did and still do. If there is a musician quite like Hooker was, I'd like to see her or him. Of course, there have been imitators and those inspired by him, but there really was no one quite like him. And one cannot copy that voice. Only mimic it. 

This piece as well as others will be a part of my watercolor portrait show coming up in April at the River's Edge Gallery in Wyandotte, MI. 

Thomas Hart Benton

This here is my most recent watercolor portrait of one of my favorite painters, Thomas Hart Benton. Benton was a regionalist painter who seemed to age like his face was a relic of weather worn strata. I tried to capture that here. He looked like he could chew through anything.

Yet, his paintings were fluid, languid and a palette all his own. He depicted life as it was and that irked a lot of people. As with a lot of people whose work I admire, i never really think that Benton would have liked a person like me much, but the more I learn about him the less I think of him like that. He painted interesting scenes and characters and in turn was an interesting character himself.

This watercolor, as well as others that I have posted here will be in a small show soon. Details forthcoming.

George Herriman

As a kid I was every much familiar with George Herriman's Krazy Kat, but until recently just hadn't acknowledged the amount of influence that his work had on my own. I must have been paying more attention than I thought. His linework seemed quick, but had purpose and did everything that linework is supposed to do in a cartoon. His topics were and are topical and I'm more than a bit surprised at how well his work holds up today. I methinks that's why they are considered classics. 

Here's a link to a site that has a good collection of Krazy Kat strips. 

And here is a link to the ebay listing, if interested in purchasing:

George Herriman 

H.R. Giger

If Edward Gorey showed me that one can laugh in dark places, H.R. Giger showed me that there is something in the darkness. The first time that I saw his artwork was from the album cover art  for Emerson, Lake & Palmer's Brain Salad Surgery and it both mystified and captivated me. I had a hard time wondering just what was going on here (it was much later that I learned what the title meant, not sure if that was what Giger meant, though). His work, among the most famous, his designs for the alien in the Alien movies, had me trying to figure out if it was about horror, lust, darkness, etc. Should I be afraid or aroused? More afraid than aroused, I think. The Swiss artist, who passed away in 2014, had an imaginative like no other, but what can you expect from a guy who slept in his bathtub.

I'm sure he was a lot nicer than how he looks in my watercolor.

David Bowie

It's been awhile since I did one of my inspiration watercolors. This time, the person who I have drawn an immense amount of inspiration from is none other than the late David Bowie.

That still doesn't sound right, but there it is.

When he died I wondered why it bothered me so much. Being that this person I had never met. Not even close. I had never even seen him in concert, dammit! Then I read something on the internet about such things and it said that these are the people that help you define who you are, who you want to be, or like to be, for that matter. I liked that and soon realized the truth in it. Bowie was always there, really. I grew up in the seventies. Spiders From Mars, Ziggy Stardust, etc. This guy wasn't Zeppelin, The Who or The Beatles. He was pretty unique. Made one think about things. I remember sitting in a friend's living room one morning while he was getting ready to walk to school and we were watching MTV and Scary Monsters and Superfreaks came on. I remember thinking just how weird that all was, but just so freaking awesome. Fame, Starman, Fashion, Rock & Roll Suicide, Golden Years, Panic In Detroit, etc. These were all distinctly Bowie. I love the words as much as the music. A true artist.

In keeping with some continuity with these watercolors, I've stuck to the three color palette and am trying to get better and better with this. A few years ago while in Iowa, I came to like the paintings of Marvin D. Cone who was a friend and fellow regionalist of Grant Wood. On some of his paintings he used this color arrangement (white, black and yellow) and I loved it.

I sneaked a little blue in there, in case you didn't notice.

Lou Reed

Lou Reed
6x9
watercolor

So, yesterday my friend and gallery director, Jeremy Hansen broke the news to me about the passing of rock legend Lou Reed. For some reason, I was glad that it was Jeremy that told me this, as he had a somewhat understanding of why I liked the music of Reed.

Anyways, as a youngster I was always fond of Perfect Day, Take A Walk On The Wild Side, and Sweet Jane. Still am. But, it was really when 1989's New York came around to my senses that I fully emersed myself in all things Lou. I got it. This guy had a voice (not so much the gravelly sound, but the inner voice) and a story to tell. A lot of stories, to be truthful. He was a man of experience, thoughts and  an adventurous spirit. And he put all of that into song and verse. He spoke as much through his skin as he did through a guitar.

He once said that his goal in making music wasn't just to do that, but to create literature. That speaks to me, man.

"My goal has been to make an album that would speak to people the way Shakespeare speaks to me, the way Joyce speaks to me. Something with that kind of power, something with bite to it." - Lou Reed.

If only I could have an ounce of that in the way that I paint or draw, to convey what is on the inside to the outside in that manner, with that power, that would be something.

I read that he was still practicing his Tai Chi exercise an hour before his passing, trying to fight for his life. I couldn't even begin to imagine what his state of mind was at that point and maybe I don't even want to know, but that is a good example of a fighter, I believe. Someone with spirit, someone with a bite to him.

Lou Reed's passing  hit me in the same way as when Freddie Mercury died. It's hard to imagine that there will be no more new music to hear, but that is the way that it goes. I think that I will go and listen to Modern Dance (from Ecstasy) and let that sink in some more.

Frank Frazetta

Frank Frazetta's oeuvre ranged from comics to book and album cover's to interior book illustrations to fine art (albeit considered low brow by some). He was the first artist that I was exposed to that could bring the fantasy world of barbarians and sorcerers  to life in such a vivid way that I felt a part of the action, that I was in the room, or in that jungle. His was a world of beautiful women, swordsmen, spacemen and monsters and it was awesome. Frazetta's ink work was just as unique and identifiable as his brushwork.

I chose to represent FF as he looked when a younger man. I could have as easily taken the more older version and that would have been just as fun, but I always liked the young artist that he was ready to take on the illustration world and all those years ahead of him. Plus, he has a cool Rat Pack, Sinatra, 50's tough guy look to him here.

Edgar Rice Burroughs

ERB
6x9
watercolour


Next up in my inspirational watercolors is none other than Edgar Rice Burroughs. I have a few writers on my list and he nears the top of it. His creations range from the jungles of Afica (Tarzan) to the far reaches of Mars (John Carter)  and it was once said that if you read a Burroughs tale that took place in a humid jungle, then you would be soaking wet after reading it. He was very descriptive in his environments. And though many were critics of his style, I found myself immersed in his worlds because of this, as if I were really there.  Or at least he was. That was his magic.

His Warlord of Mars series began in the early 1900's and I can never help but think of what people originally thought of these tales. What an imagination!

I'm currently finishing up the last book in his Caspak series with Out of Time's Abyss and wonder why this one wasn't made into a movie as with the first two (The Land That Time Forgot and the People That Time Forgot). Maybe it was, but went straight to the sci-fi channel (I refuse to spell it the way it is now...).

With this watercolor I experimented with the limited palette once again, but this time tried using three colors that the Iowan painter Marvin D. Cone used in some of his door paintings. White, black and yellow. The next few may be with this same color scheme as I try to get it to where I want it.

Arthur Rackham

Arthur Rackham was one of those artists that was a huge influence on me far before I realized that he was a huge influence on me. My childhood, as for many others, was filled with his images of elves, goblins, dragons and mermaids, all the good things necessary for a right good adventure. In fact, his artwork for these tales always seemed to me to be the authoritative voice for all of these things, as if the artwork itself was a deep part of the folklore and fairy tale passed down through the ages. He was the camera that followed Alice down the rabbit hole and watched as Seigfried slew the dragon Fafner.

His use of mixing charcoal and watercolours was a revelation to me when hearing of it for the first time. Such a unique combination that worked so well for what he was representing.

I had debated whether or not to post this watercolor, as I felt uneasy about it, not quite hitting what I had hoped to achieve. But, the more I looked at it, the more I thought maybe I'd show it. After all, I have never been the best barometer of my own work...

I do see now what I could have done differently, so all is not lost as far as learning from it. Now, if I could only borrow one of Rackham's elves to help me with the details...

Wislawa Szymboska

I haven't posted one of these watercolor portraits in awhile and I wrestled with the notion of putting this one up. I'm not sure what I think of it and after some time to look at it more I think I like it less than I did. So, of course, I post it.

As with authors, not all of my inspirations are visual ones, such as painters and sculptors. Some are poets, too. Well, maybe quite a few are poets as they stir a different pot for me, or within me, as the case may be. Such has it been with Wislawa Szymborska, the Polish poet who passed away earlier this year. I discovered her writings with her 1995 book, View With A Grain Of Sand. She certainly painted and sculpted with words and filled me with visuals that I could and will never experience.

A bit of humor here from the poem, A Moment In Troy:

"Those tall, dark movie stars,
  their girlfriends' older brothers,
  the teacher from art class,
  alas, they must all be slain."

Or, this passage from the poem One Version Of Events, which has always haunted me:

"Each of us wished to have a homeland
 free of neighbors
 and to live his entire life
 in the intervals between wars."

I tried a different color scheme with this portrait and I wonder if this glows too much. I wanted warmth, I may have achieved something else.

Woody Allen

I suppose that my offbeat, quirky, pointless and sometimes irritating sense of humor comes from the many many movies that I've watched in my lifetime. Some of that had to stick, right? Well, Woody Allen films probably have a pretty big impact on what I think is funny. From the first time I saw Take The Money And Run when I was a kid, I was hooked. Seeing him as a kid thief and getting his arm stuck in the gum ball machine and running down the street with it to later on when he was breaking out of prison using a gun carved from soap, so that when it rained it turned all sudsy on him, was hilarious stuff. Throughout the 70's (Sleeper, Annie Hall), the 80's (The Purple Rose Of Cairo, New York Stories), the 90's (Mighty Aphrodite), the 00's (Whatever Works) to his latest films (Midnight In Paris), I have always found something funny, cerebral and quirky to hold my interest and to get me thinking. I look forward to what future flicks this man has in store for us.

Jacques Cousteau

As a kid Jacques Cousteau fueled my desire for adventure coupled with my love for animals, especially those of an aquatic nature. Nothing excited me more than the possibility of one day jumping into the water to swim, study and film whales, sharks, octopi and all those other wonderful sea creatures. I thought that maybe that desire had faded over the years, but the more I thought about it the more I knew it hadn't. There were just other interests that piled up among the old ones. So many adventures, so little time...

Recently, I had the opportunity to explore the life of Cousteau a bit more by reading a biography on him. It was great to rekindle that spark that was ignited so long ago and to learn more about the man himself and what made him tick. There really aren't too many souls around anymore with his view on life and the world and that is a sad thing. Hopefully, his son Jean-Michael can carry on and inspire others the way that  his father did for me.

Jane Goodall

Back in the 70's and early 80's I used to absorb copies of National Geographic like a sponge soaking up anything I could animal related. I was always in the library looking up back issues or borrowing them from my geography teacher. One of my favorite's was the British primatologist and anthropologist, Jane Goodall. Back then I was a big fan of Louis Leakey, so Goodall was a logical next step for my interests. National Geographic always seemed to have plenty of articles about her and the research being done, so I always seemed to have access to her world in a vicarious way.

She always seemed to be a decent human being who brought a sense of compassion to the scientific community. Why more people don't admire this women is beyond me. She was definitely an important person in my formative years and I still have a great deal of respect for her and the work that her institute is doing.

A suggested book to read is The Ten Trusts by Goodall and Marc Bekoff.

Kurt Vonnegut

No one had his finger on the pulse of America more so than Kurt Vonnegut. The guy used wit and humor to portray the best and worst that a human being could be. His words painted the human drama in a way that was uniquely Vonnegut and there will never be another one like him, just as with most of the great original thinkers.
And he knew what it was all about. Or what it should be all about, that is.

"You just have to be kind, baby."

Ernest Hemingway

Ernest Hemingway is another one of my literary inspirations. I just love his writings. For Whom The Bell Tolls is probably my favorite book of all time. It's haunting and hopeful and tragic. For those that know me, they may think that Hemingway would not be such a draw for me being that he tells many tales of hunters and how rough and tough they think they are and those kinds of people just really turn me off, but he wrote so much deeper than that. These stories weren't so much about hunting as they were about the inner struggles of mankind. There's a hunt going on, but not one that is on the surface. At least, that is how I see it.

Hemingway mastered the art of conversation, as well. Short sentences that were long on dialogue. He was a journalist who turned his adventures on the war fronts into literary ones. He lived quite a life in wildly exciting times. One filled with travel, women, booze and maybe just a little too much bravado. I think that that had a lot with his early exit from life, but who knows?

I've tried, mostly unsuccessfully, to paint or to illustrate like Hemingway wrote. It's a lofty goal and one that I may never succeed at, but I keep trying and I keep his words always in the back of my mind rolling around with Verne and Vonnegut.

He left us with many wonderful stories

Jules Verne

I think before any other author, Jules Verne probably jump started my imagination first. Starting with Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea up through some of his more obscure works, the gears of imagination and adventure were working overtime within me. Still are and, hopefully will be for years to come. My first encounter with Verne's TTLUTS (looks dirty, don't it?) was most likely with the Disney flick starring Kirk Douglas. The only two good things in that movie were the design of the Nautilus, which might only be equalled by the one drawn by Kevin O'Neill in the League Of Extraordinary Gentleman and the second being Kirk Douglas' portrayal of Ned Land. Well, once I discovered the books I was well on my way to an imaginative and creative life.

A part of Verne's works that has always amazed me is just how accurate he was in predicting the future. Whether society took their cues from his writings, or he was just that intuitive remains up for debate, I suppose. From The Earth To The Moon (his launch site was just a few miles away from where Cape Canaveral is now) to Paris In The Twentieth Century (fax machines, monorails...) he seemed to have a way of making the future seem possible, hence The Godfather Of Science Fiction.

Jules Verne's adventures were played out in all sorts of places and with all sorts of modes of transportation, whether it was underground, in the sky, under water, or in space, using ropes, pickaxes, dirigibles, submarines, rockets and balloons. High adventure is where's it's at.

Gustave Dore

One of the best black and white illustrators ever, Gustave Dore (1832-1883) was hugely popular in his own time, his services constantly in demand. He illustrated all of the best tales of the time, including The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner, Grimm's Fairy Tales, Paradise Lost, The Adventures Of Baron Munchausen, to name but a few.

For me, as with so many others, I'm sure, it's all about that beautiful and intricate line work. I could get lost in there and have many a times. I can only imagine the amount of planning that Dore must have gone through to lay out all of the line work, thick and thin to get the most impact in depth and lighting and atmosphere. And any and all artists should study his works for his compositions, as well. Truly a master of line, form and composition and one I draw a great deal of inspiration from.